Educational Journey into CMS – starting with Joomla!

About

Web Design

Cerro Coso College - Ridgecrest Campus

I started this blog before completing my AS in Web Design at Cerro Coso College in May 2010. I earned my Web Design Certificate from Cerro Coso in less than 2 years with a 4.0 grade point average. I plan on taking all of the courses I can afford because along with real experience in the field, the teachers at this college in particular have opened many opportunities while sharing their experience and they hold each student to a very high standard. Currently I am employed at Cerro Coso in a pilot program as the Supplmental Instructor/Tutor for the Digital Media Arts department. In this capacity I am helping people become strong online students and assisting with the concepts of design. I retired from the FAA as an Air Traffic Controller in 2008 after more than 29 years of service.

I am starting my freelance career with an eye out for education by sharing my experiences with my clients, peers and anyone interested in the field of Web Design and Development. Design is my passion as I continue to learn the best way to translate a message – your message – into a website that will grow alongside your business – a faithful companion.

Quilting

I learning how to put colors together after taking a quilt class in 1996. I had no great love for sewing, and promised to NEVER pick up a sewing machine again after pulling one of two ‘insert zipper’ requirements out of a shoebox for my final grade in 8th grade Home Economics. I mean, there were students that got graded on ‘running stitch’, and I slaved away – one of the last to leave the classroom that day.

Tehachapi

Years later, I started collecting quilt magazines, and changed my vow from ‘never’ to ‘if this sewing machine can be renovated, I will try quilting’. I sat in the corner of the quilt store with my ‘how to thread a sewing machine’ pamphlet as the shop keeper eyed me with a bit of a twinkle in her eye. To this day, the owner knows she can toss tissue clothes patterns in my face and watch me shrivel into a shaking mess of nerves – quilting is the only form of sewing that I love. I took to this new hobby so enthusiastically that I worked part time – between full time work as an FAA Air Traffic Controller – working for fabric discounts instead of money – at 5 Hearts Quilt store in Tehachapi. I even wrote a newsletter for the shop, and was honored to accompany the shop owner to the annual Houston International Quilt Festival – one of the largest conventions that the George Brown Houston Convention Center accommodates.

I have over 60 unfinished quilt projects, and ideas for patterns almost daily. I worked up some samples for the quilt shop, such as the one posted below.

Matching colors

Quilting is where I learned to take a ‘focus fabric’ containing 4 or 5 colors (in this case it is the border), and pull colors that can be lighter or darker values, or exact matches to the ‘focus fabric’. I also learned to match either bright white or cream colors to any focus fabric that I would find difficult to match colors with – or look at a fabric piece through a red or green piece of glass which would block distracting bright colors and help me discern the color values in grey. More values and variations mean more visual interest.

Web Design

So, here we are at the bottom of the page, and finally leading into saying that this quilting experience along with retiring from Air Traffic Control (a field I dearly loved) seem to point toward Web Design. I have posted some of my Photoshop CS3 and classwork on another page. The ‘design’ part of Web Design seems to be the one I am learning the most about and what I love best. I hope to learn from every artistic skill my fellow students, peers and instructors can lend me….I need your help – I learn from everyone. Thanks for being there!